


Barely Leashed Thing

by motleystitches (furius)



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Regency, Byronic Heroes, Charles Is a Darling, F/F, F/M, Jealousy, Romantic Fluff, erik the happy bunny
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-09
Updated: 2013-03-09
Packaged: 2017-12-04 12:53:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/710990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/furius/pseuds/motleystitches
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erik Lehnsherr is doing the Grand Tour with Charles Francis Xavier, Lord of Westchester. He's not sure what is happening, but he's actually quite happy.  Then Byron showed up.</p><p>A fluffy Regency romance,</p>
            </blockquote>





	Barely Leashed Thing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [icecreamwolf](https://archiveofourown.org/users/icecreamwolf/gifts).



“And this is-” Lord G— jerked his chin towards him.

“Allow me to present,” Charles smiled, his devastating glance settling on all the ladies in their little circle before continuing, “Erik Lehnsherr, my incubus.”

Erik couldn’t help the strangled sound that emerged from his throat, drowned in all the soft gasps. This group was particular bold, for none had lowered her eyes. Half the scandalized looks were directed towards Charles, the other half, Erik bore as stoically as he could, pretending ignorance of the few that turned assessing. 

“You mock us, Lord Xavier, the identity is to be secret before a masquerade.” Lady G— said delicately, deftly preventing the mustached gentleman at her side from speaking. “Mr. Lehnsherr, a pleasure to make your acquaintance. Welcome to my little soiree.”

So that was his introduction to this particular contingent of aristocrats, Erik thought as he spoke unexceptionally and conducted himself in the same manner. He could not address any of the younger ladies without implicating himself in affairs he was woefully unprepared to diffuse. With alarm, he avoided the advances of the widows or other women who brought enough colour without disrepute to the room. The society abroad was necessarily less stringent than one he might’ve encountered in England, but there were only so many conversations he could have about the Grand Tour — the only respectable conversation he had — without the urge to tell them all to stuff their heads while Charles danced with one silly girl after the next.

Loath as he was to admit it, he preferred Italy during the day, when Charles declaimed beside the ruins in what he claimed was divinely inspired poetry, blue eyes more fervently than the summer sky, so that Erik flushed from more than heat and felt all too vividly, the chill of the carefully packed wine their ancient guide brought up.

Even worse tonight, McCoy was laid up at home having attempted to impress Raven with a leap that nearly hobbled him. Raven had no lack for partners and was not the happier for it. 

“How long shall you insist on playing this game?” he asked Charles on the carriage ride back. Raven had left earlier in the evening. “An incubus, really.” 

Charles had excused himself from the English ambassador to Italy by claiming, rather loudly even amidst the buzz of music and conversation, “My incubus calls me away” and clearly delighting in the outrage on the gentlemen’s faces, took Erik’s arm and left with only a nod.

The torchlights in the streets dappled through the window. Charles blinked his eyes open. The rosy imprint on his cheeks looked more innocent than the aftereffects of too much wine. “Erik, do you tire of me? Would you leave me?”

“No,” Erik answered shortly. The question was so very unfair.

“But they’re very tiring,” Charles yawned. “You are interesting. I want them to think you’re interesting, too. Your name, though very nice, would not produce the desired effect.”

Charles was being unnecessarily flattering. Erik knew his name was nothing. He could be Magnus Lehnsherr and no one would know the difference. Trust Charles to derail his anger; however, being noticed by men and women who previously would not admit him beyond the foyer of their houses, never mind into their dining rooms, was unexpectedly exciting. Sometimes Erik wondered if he had swallowed too much saltwater before Charles drew him out of the waves. Surely this was mad- a Jew sitting in silks and velvet in a carriage, complaining of his treatment to Charles, Lord Xavier to his lessers.

“Something less demonic, next time,” Erik relented. “I don’t want them to think me as ready to ravish their daughters.” Or themselves, Erik recalled with a shudder. He told himself it was because he wouldn’t fancy the chance of discovery, but-

“No, that would be awful,” Charles agreed. He stumbled forward from his seat, knocking their knees together. Erik reached out and steadied him before Charles slid into the space next to him, stroked Erik’s hand. “You wouldn’t ravish anyone.”

Neither would Charles, propensity to invite shocked gasps and scandalized looks aside. From what Erik had observed, the most scandalous thing Charles ever did was to take up with Erik.

“You were bored,” Charles said.

“Yes.” 

“I am sorry.”

Erik gritted his teeth. “Don’t apologise.”

“I promise you’ll get to dance next time.”

“I don’t see how that’s possible,” Erik said, because he was no one—even incubus had no estates— but Charles was already asleep, his feathery curls tickling Erik’s chin.

-=-=

“Lord Francis Xavier,” the servant announced. “Mr. Erik Lehnsherr.”

Erik had ceased to be self-conscious after a week hearing his name called out, if not with reverence, at least respectfully by a footman beneath a powdered wig. However, he still tensed when the conversation turned to Charles’ “delightful friend” and why they had never heard of him before. Charles liked his audience nonplussed. When Erik seemed to protest, Charles then reassured him that it would only be until his book was published; Erik had read a few pages the book, supposedly a scientific treatise that would guarantee Charles’ place in the Royal Society, that was crawled at the rate of indecipherable scribbles.

“Erik is not his real name,” Charles said, conspiratorially, as if Erik was not standing beside him. “I found him in the Attic wilds, sleeping among the grass and in a tunic such as the ancients might wear, a shepherd’s crook in his arm. He knew neither the year nor the place. Even his language was strange.” Erik bit back a laugh; he had been cursing Charles in Hebrew the first time they met, that was the only truth in the tale so far. “Eventually, he talked about dreams of silver and moon.”

“So you named him and took him away to dress him in…purple?” asked a blonde lady in diamonds, sardonic, eyeing Erik’s silk waistcoat. “Are you not afraid of a goddess’ wrath?”

“Why Ms. Frost? What form of revenge shall she take? Do you think she’ll make me mad?” Charles asked playfully. “But is it fair to keep a man from life? From the pleasures of music, of dancing, of your conversation?” 

“Poor Endymion does not know how to dance?” Another girl sounded woebegone, gazing at Erik under impossible lashes. There were always a great many girls around Charles, Erik once commented. More, Charles had answered, because you were here. 

“My sister has attempted, but you know Raven’s temperament,” Charles replied to the flutter of fans and perfume. Indeed, Raven’s temperament was a matter of legend. From what Erik had learned of the behavior of society, he wouldn’t be surprised that the Xaviers had left England as much as it was by their own desire as it was for the peace of mind of various families of their circle. Dr. Hank McCoy, despite being nominally Charles’ personal physician, spent more time with Raven than with Charles. Erik had suspected to have entered an unorthodox arrangement the first night he saw them lounging by the fire. After all, there was Charles, his mouth a contradiction of blasé coquetry and deep certainty, “As a favour to me, lovely Miss Moira, would you teach him and be a guide to his pagan soul?”

Ms. Frost raised an incredulous eyebrow. Miss Moira’s eyes darted to one of the matrons at the far end of the room; her chaperone was likely engaged in other matters. Erik sighed, but felt Charles hand in the small of his back, so he bowed, murmured pleasantries, and asked a place on her dance card.

“He even speaks,” Ms. Frost said, but rather high-handedly told Charles she would reserve a place for his fascinating Classically-shaped discovery. 

It was not that Erik did not know how to dance; he was vain enough that he knew he cut a fine figure. Charles had stinted no expense on his wardrobe, going as far as to propose to make a trip to France for a certain tailor’s cut of dinner-coat, an offer which Erik quite firmly declined. As much as Erik could’ve felt he was some curiosity being circulated for amusement; Charles so clearly enjoyed the same attention that he couldn’t muster any resentment. Furthermore, Miss Moira’s conversation had an unexpected scope he was relishing.

“Is that better, fair Endymion?” Charles asked by the refreshment table. “You’ve not sat down since you begun. Have you learned what you come to learn?”

Lord Byron was coming to Rome. Dr. Sebastian Shaw was among those who had never managed to return from North Africa after insinuating himself with the French. The former he supposed was general gossip, the latter was an unexpected piece of news that he didn’t expect a girl would think to communicate, but perhaps Charles suspected Moira’s rather esoteric conversation to involve matters in the parliament and _Naval Gazette_ ; upon reflection, the tendency might be why she was in Italy instead of in a London townhouse with a husband and household of servants. Charles had a knack, to say the least, of what everyone knew and how to allow them to find each other. Erik was growing aware that Charles’ wild manner had an arcane art to it.

“I think you might seem bit touched by the gods.” Erik paused, watching Raven and McCoy execute the last steps in a well practised turn; the gold threaded muslin of her gown glittered in the candlelight. “Or else, a favorite.”

“Do I?” asked Charles, pleased. There was sweat gleaming on his red upperlip. “Am I?” 

“I hope it is the second,” Erik said, watching his mouth. “Since you’ve proclaimed me your friend.”

“My friend, have I not said we’re bookends of a single soul?” Charles looked up at him through his lashes.

So casual with it, when Erik wanted Charles serious. It was like a spot on a polished mirror, or a flaw in fine porcelain. “You should’ve been a librarian. When did soul develop bookends,” he muttered.

Charles threw him a bright smile. “You’re truly _a muse_ , if you don’t mind the comparison. Perhaps it would be better Greek?” 

Erik shook his head. The pun was abominable, but he couldn’t help the burst of affection. He whispered in Charles ear: “No, as long as I do not have to wear a dress.”

“Such antiquated notions, darling,” Charles said, so quietly that Erik thought the words were only in his head. 

-=-=

“He is an architect,” Charles declared this time, to Erik’s relief. He had not quite recovered from the masquerade. He was Apollo, not Incubus, though there seemed to be little difference based on the reactions to his outfit. Not a dress, though it would probably be less scandalous than the tunic. He could not sit at all and finally borrowed Raven’s crimson cape since she had decided to show off her Italian cavalier’s costume, though still wearing the domino. Charles continued, “He’s to renovate my ancestral seat after we finish the tour.”

Architecture was not the least bit interesting, even common, except Charles’ ancestral seat was Westchester Abbey, one of the most sinister and haunted places in England, or so said McCoy, who was working on a book — it seemed quite the fashion, though McCoy’s was mostly secret and actually making progress— concerning a legend of the abbey called The Beast, a monster that was said to have the head of a lion, the agility of an ape, and the intelligence and wickedness of a man.

Still, Erik considered being an uninteresting architect was Charles’ way of apology. It had been a fortnight since they arrived in Venice. The English season was beginning; many of their acquaintances were leaving. Erik, vaguely uneasy, considered that perhaps it was time he should leave, too, but the Xaviers had made no indication of returning. It was impossible to exhaust Italy, but it was possible to become bored. Perhaps Charles did mean to hire him as an architect, if he didn’t mind for Westchester Abbey to have battlements; a fortifications engineer had limited training for graceful arches and buttresses. Erik had made walls to be impenetrable. 

He was abruptly thrust in front of a strangely familiar face.

“Lord Byron, Lord Xavier, Mr. Lehnsherr.” 

“We’ve been introduced,” Byron said. His glance fell on Erik. “I see he has not forsaken you for the seas.”

Byron was the one who had lent Charles the boat. The meeting had not made much impression on Erik. Half-drowned, he wouldn’t have known the difference between one curled darling from the next. And as it was now as it had been then, the one who dove in after him commanded his attention.

“Mr. Lehnsherr was uncovered from the seas. I was present for the occasion,” Byron was explaining. “He was introduced to me as one of the mer-people.” 

“I’m certain I inserted a ‘perhaps’ in the phrase.”

“I am certain, Lord Xavier, that your precise words were ‘look, Byron, for all your swimming, you’ve never found a denizen of these wine dark seas.’ I’d also to add that I still have not,” said Byron. He was in a foul mood. Erik wondered if his melancholy was supposed to be charming when it expressly was not. Charles, however, seemed unaffected to be accused as a liar, even a fanciful one.

“But the lands have been more kinder to you than to me,” he said gently.

“Have they?” Byron asked, his eyes settling on Erik at first, then more disturbingly, on Charles. Byron was very pale, the blue-veins almost visible beneath the skin; his mouth of a red more reminiscent of blood than rose; his eyes were pale with no particular colour.

There had been a circle of people; they had dispersed, perhaps unwilling to witness whatever argument that would ensue; Byron’s tantrums had dark endings. A candle began to gutter then extinguished. The smell of beeswax dominated the scents in the room. Erik put a hand on Charles elbow, thinking to draw him away, but Charles ignored him and commenced an animated discussion regarding the rights of all men.

Erik consoled with himself that at the very least, Charles could not be sharing his verses to Erik with Byron who was standing far close and paid too much attention to Charles’ who was, for once, serious in a way that Erik seldom saw him. 

Then somehow, after a rather sober ride in a gondola, they were consuming vats of claret until two in the morning in Byron’s apartments, when Erik finally succumbed to exhaustion and followed a disgruntled maid to a guestroom. There was an obese badger sleeping on the bed. She removed it with a sigh and left with the candle, leaving Erik in the darkness.

He washed briefly, undressed, got under unfamiliar sheets, and closed his eyes, dreaming stones and ruins until he was startled awake. The stars were disappearing with the dawn. His throat felt dry.

Down the hallway, the sound of familiar laughter drew him. Charles was never awake so early, but then he heard another voice, lower. The door was ajar. He caught a glimpse of dark tussled head. There was a finger stroking down the white column of Charles’ throat, the other hand unraveling the stock that Erik had fixed in the boat.

“Sailors see mermaids, Xavier, only when they’re at sea.” He could only hear the drawl, but imagined too easily that pale high-arched brow, the languid gaze, the petulant mouth. “Though you dress his waist very well.”

Erik felt like he was burning from the inside. He licked his mouth and tasted salt. To his horror, he had begun to weep, possessed by a protest he did not dare to utter or even to examine: Charles had not asked, and if then? He kept firm merely the thought that he would not see those small hands venturing beyond Charles’ collar. His stocking-ed feet were silent on the carpetsas he returned to the room. The badger had returned and had burrowed under the covers. He let it be, dressed, and let himself out.

=-=

“Charles arrived in the middle of breakfast yelling that you’ve turned into a badger. Thank goodness you’re still here sulking.” Raven swept into view.

“And where is he now?”

“Coaxing the animal into a new waistcoat.”

“What?” It was absurd. For all his wild talk, Charles was an intelligent man. Poison came to mind. Erik stood and rummaged in his half-packed bag.  
Raven’s eyes widened to see the pistol in his hand. She hurried after him as he searched the palazzo. He found them in Charles’ dressing room.

“Do you shoot?” Byron asked, looking scarcely awake on the couch. A wiry-haired dog lounging at his feet cast a supercilious look at Erik. 

“Erik!” From the mirror, Charles’ eyes looked shocked and tired. His valet was in the middle of dressing him. “I thought you felt unwell. Why are in your greatcoat? Are you going somewhere?” 

“Raven mentioned something about a badger.” Raven, incidentally, had disappeared when Erik was sure she had just been behind him. Belatedly, Erik realized he might’ve fallen for a prank, possibly to avenge his interruption last night.

“Badger?” In only his shirtsleeves, Charles always looked ridiculously young and particularly innocent.  
Three pieces of silver, Erik thought, that was the gondolier’s price when he saw him coming out of Byron’s house in a shameful state of distress. Facing those Italian sloe eyes in the dark, the distress had only increased at the offer, though the shame had turned indignant remembering Charles would not even _ask_.

“Did one escape from your menagerie, Byron?” Charles was asking.

Byron yawned. “If anything escaped, it’s not one of mine.”

Charles eyes travelled to the gun, now hanging loosely in Erik’s hand at his side. “Are you feeling better? Do you want to go shooting? I suppose it is the season for...pheasants?”

“And this is why, Xavier, you’ll never make a natural philosopher. There are no pheasants in Italy. Also, it’s already March.”  


Charles’ uncertainty was difficult to bear. Erik could say he wanted to leave, but he did not and he still wasn’t sure if Byron’s very presence was some sort of poison, infecting his mind, for now he looked at Charles and dear as he was still, Erik suddenly suffered from a terrible compulsion to clasp him within his arms and keep everyone away. Blast Raven and McCoy and their ignorance of decent privacy.

“Perhaps a change of scenery would do you good. The carnival’s over anyways. You look a little flushed.” The back of Charles’ hand touched his forehead. The intimacy of the gesture startled Erik. A tension caught between his chest and throat. His eyes began to sting a little. “You seem a bit feverish, but Padua, perhaps? They’ve miraculous thermal baths, I hear.”

“Hot enough to boil a fish,” Byron added. 

Erik, too unsettled by himself let Charles ordered all the arrangements to be made. He didn’t even protest after learning Byron had offered the use of his villa because Byron had made himself scarce when Charles thought Erik was unwell and almost declined all invitations, much to Raven’s consternation. And still, when Erik looked across from the chess board as they indulged in the usual evening chess games, he thought that there must be a Venetian miasma that affected him, for the tension in him did not ease and his thoughts wandered.

Had Charles always looked at him so fondly? How long would he continue to do so? Society had opened to him in Charles’ presence as he shared all his advantages with Erik when Erik shared with Charles only his dubious company and his chess games. 

He lost badly during those evenings, but Charles merely attributed it to Erik’s illness and made gifts of sweetmeats to him when he claimed to have no appetite.

At Padua, they did go shooting. Charles supplied the guns. Byron made it a competition, and when no clear winner emerged, proposed a swimming match. Charles looked at the darkened sky, the foaming waters, and forfeited. Then Erik saw Byron’s smile, his hand on the small of Charles’ back as he lowered his head to whisper by his ear. Erik started to take off his coat and boots, compelling Byron to do the same while Charles stood frowning by the dogs, two cravats like white flags in hand.

The moment Erik surfaced from the plunge, he fought the undertow that threatened to take him under. Byron must be the stronger swimming from his swims in the Grand Canal; else, he knew the currents of the river better, for he was effortlessly ahead while Erik struggled in the freezing water. He lost consciousness for a moment and found himself adrift down one of the smaller tributaries. The sight of shore emerged just as his feet felt the pebbles. 

He began running. He had an unerring sense of direction, but he realized he had no stopping place, so he continued on. The woods grew thicker and darker. Twigs snapped beneath his bare feet, but he felt as if he was still in the river. It had begun to rain. He heard baying of hounds behind him, instinct took over and he ran faster.

Then the air was knocked out of him as a weight careened into him at the waist and he fell to the ground. 

“Erik, you-“ Charles, for once, seemed at loss for words. He was lying on top of Erik, a figure from Renaissance painting, skin gilded warm gold by the afternoon sun. “You’re shivering.”

Erik was. He was freezing and Charles was warm. He reached up—his arms were trembling— embraced and kissed him. 

Charles flowed into the kiss. He kissed Erik’s mouth, his face, his neck, and everywhere he touched as a warm lick of fire. Erik felt him hard against his thigh and began to strip him out of his jacket, then tangled his fingers in his cravat before thinking to unbutton his waistcoat. Charles was faster; he had already unbuttoned Erik’s breeches and was peeling the sodden material down his legs. His hands, which Erik had observed at billiards, at dinners, at dances, at countless mundane episodes, felt like brands on the skin inside his knees. When he felt their warm on his bare hip, he wrestled Charles onto his back and sat astride him. 

“Are you-“ Charles was still half-clothed. His legs were only bare mid-thigh. Even his cravat was still tied. Erik had made it a hopeless tangle. In answer, Erik gritted his teeth and reached behind himself, his fingers already slippery. He bent forward and shushed Charles with his mouth.

“What am I?” he asked, his tongue teasing against the curve of those lips.

“Next time, I shall introduce you as Chevalier Erik, Knight Erik,” Charles smiled beneath him. “Sir,” he said beneath Erik, almost breathless as Erik straightened and bore down and felt Charles' hands slip from his waist to his buttocks, “you have a lovely seat.”

Erik laughed, rocking forward, then gasped. Waves of pleasure crashed into him with every movement, yet he was becoming over heated. He was certain his face was flushed, perhaps as much as Charles'. 

Charles’ eyes had darkened, the blue of his eyes was a ring around the black, and his mouth was open and soft looking. Erik kissed him again, tasted his lips, his tongue, swallowed the syllables of his own name from Charles’ mouth while Charles’ hands roamed on his skin then pulled him toward a joyful crisis. 

The evening had nearly fallen by the time they finished dressing, Charles kissing the divots of his muscles as he lovingly tugged up Erik’s breeches while Erik picked away the leaves and twigs in Charles’ hair. He was making a cursory attempt at brushing away the debris from the back of Charles’ waistcoat glad that the coat had fared better when he saw where they were.

Charles followed his gaze and kissed Erik again. Beside a spilled plate of oil was a bundle of flowers. And above the flowers was the face of Janus, god of beginnings. 

-=-=

**Author's Note:**

> The Grand Tour: the 17th-19th century version of study abroad for young English noblemen. 
> 
> Incubus: a male sex demon.
> 
> Endymion: Greek myths: a shepherd so lovely that Artemis/Diane caused him to fall into a deep sleep so she could kiss him in his dreams. 
> 
> Wine-dark sea is an allusion to the Iliad.
> 
> Sailors supposedly see mermaids when they become sex-starved after being too long at sea.
> 
> Parts of Hank's narrative IS based on Polidori, who was Byron's young and personable personal physician who tried to impress Mary Shelley (thereby twisting his ankle requiring Byron to carry him into the house) and ultimately wrote "The Vampyre".
> 
> Byron's characterization is obviously semi-fictionalized, but apparently he was rather dissolute in Venice (more than usual) and his apartments had animals running around, including badgers. And he did have a villa in Este (near Padua) which he leased from Hoppner. He also had a knack for challenging people to swimming matches. 
> 
> This fic supposedly takes place in 1819. Gondoliers in Venice at the time were known to offer sexual services.


End file.
